The Last
by Saesama
Summary: Nothing is eternal. Eventually, even that which seems immortal must end. Character Death


I wrote this some time ago, probably well over a year ago. No idea why I haven't uploaded it before now.

o o o

Red eyes looked down at the Canyon, running along curves and edges that had slowly changed over the last seven hundred years yet were always the same, always Cosmo Canyon. The little village had spread out perhaps a mile along the cliff face, built in the old ways of wooden buildings on high struts and tunnels bored into the red rock. The eyes followed the movement of tiny figures before the city, the long, loping shapes of the feline residents of the Canyon, racing and playing in the open plain before the city. He smiled. The great leader of the pack had once thought himself the last of his kind; at least, until a tribe of the felines had been found in the mountains of Nieblheim, hiding in a series of caves. Nanaki had led the twenty of them to the Canyon and now, ten generations later, there were over five thousand of the great felines living in and around the Canyon.

With a smile, the man with the red eyes goaded his black mount forward, starting down the mountain. He got a new Chocobo rather randomly, sometimes choosing to travel by foot for a period of years. But he always got a new Chocobo, always black, before officially visiting the city. After all, he had a seven hundred year old reputation to protect.

They smelled him before they saw him, and when he was within hailing distance, they swarmed towards him in a flood of fur and claws and wild manes and bright, intelligent eyes. Vincent Valentine smiled to himself and led his Chocobo forward. The bird had been trained to not shy from the intelligent felines of the Canyon. They surrounded him, laughing and talking and each trying to get close to the man that had been there and gone and there again for their entire lives. Vincent actually threw back his head and laughed as they entered the city in a parade of fur led by feathers.

The older generations of felines and the humans of the city left their homes to cheer for Vincent as he made his way to the oldest part of the city, the section that Vincent remembered best, where the old observatory still stood. Nanaki stood there, at the foot of the great stone steps, a smile on his scarred face as he watched his oldest friend attempt to disembark without stepping on someone. He made his way through the crowd and bowed low before the Lord of the Canyon. "Hello, Lord Nanaki." He said, his voice still velvet smooth and deep.

"Nice to see you again, Vincent." Nanaki replied. He turned and started back up the stairs, Vincent by his side. "It seems the welcoming party is larger each time you come."

Vincent chuckled. The two had changed little in the long years since Meteor. Vincent's hair had gone from raven black to slate gray, streaked in silver at his temples. His face had aged gracefully over time, leaving him still handsome, but lined with long years of travel and knowledge. He was still as lithe as ever, taking the stairs as easily as he had when he first visited the city so many years before. Nanaki was still fire red, still sleek and powerful, but much larger than he had been when the two met. He had grown to a little over five feet at the shoulder, much larger than any of the other felines. The fur around his nose and mouth had turned fine gray over the years, along with a shock of mane right at the front of his head, but the rest of him remained unchanged, except for one addition. The XIII tattoo on his shoulder had been added to, making it a meaningless lattice-work design instead of a mark of Hojo.

"Can I ask as to the reason of your visit?" Nanaki asked as they reached the top of the stairs.

"Do I need a reason to visit an old friend?" Vincent asked in return. But his eyes, as he looked at Nanaki, told a different story. Nanaki read the message clear enough. Wait until we are alone.

o o o

The passage of three hours, dinner, and visits from several members of the community left the last two Avalanche members alone in the old observatory, Nanaki lounging on a long bed, Vincent relaxed into a large, soft chair. "What troubles you, my friend?" Nanaki asked.

"You are dying." Vincent replied. Nanaki was too used to the gunman's straightforward attitude to flinch from his words. "You do not have much longer on this planet, and therefore, neither do I."

Nanaki looked up sharply at this. "What does that mean?" he asked.

Vincent smiled sadly. "I discovered around the time of Cloud's death that I could die whenever I wished, simply by willing myself to end. I did not, for I did not wish for you to be the last, all alone."

Nanaki laughed softly. "And to think we called you cold." he said, shaking his head. "You seem to care more than most."

"It is hard to not care," Vincent said. "When you have as deep a bond with someone as we all had."

"Indeed." Nanaki said.

"I came to suggest," Vincent said, leaning forward. "That we travel together once more, to visit the old memory's one last time before we leave."

"Vincent Valentine, are you getting nostalgic?" Nanaki asked, grinning.

Vincent had the good grace to look sheepish. "Maybe I am." He admitted. "But you have not been from the Canyon in a long time. I thought perhaps you would like to see them all before the chance escapes you. Just the two of us, alone with our memories."

"It sounds like a very good idea." Nanaki said, scratching briefly at his neck with a massive hind paw. "Shall we leave tonight?"

"Can we? A good number of people will be watching your home tonight."

Nanaki gave Vincent a long glance. "You are doubting OUR abilities to tread silently and unseen?" He asked.

Vincent smirked, for a moment looking like the Turk he had once been. Nanaki was right. They had power and skill far beyond nearly every resident of the Canyon, even of the entire planet. Age had only taken their friends from them, not their skills.

"Fine. We leave tonight."

o o o

Aerith had been the first, of course, taken from them before their quest was over. After Meteor, the members of Avalanche had scattered across the globe to live out their lives.

Yuffie had been the first to die after Meteor. Only five years had passed before she was caught in a fierce storm on a helicopter. Neither she nor the pilot had survived. Yuffie had left behind two daughters and a young husband; and Wutai had mourned for a month for their fallen princess.

Reeve had been next. He had taken the rebuilding of Neo-Midgar on his own shoulders, aided by the reformed Turks. But he had been older and far more stressed than anyone had thought; he had a heart attack a little over two years after Yuffie's death. The Turks had made sure that Reeve's greatest dream, a museum of the true events surrounding Meteor, came to fruition.

Barrett was next. He had returned to Corel and convinced the town to reopen the mines. Some six years after Reeve's death, there was a cave in in one mine. Barrett had held the weight of tons of stone on his massive shoulders for the time it took for the men and women with him to escape, but he had not been so fortunate. The collapsed mine shaft was carefully guarded as his tomb.

Cid suffered longer than the rest. His years after Meteor were spent running a courier service with Shera that catered across the globe. Eight years after Barrett's death, Cid was flying the Tiny Bronco _II _when a faulty engine part blew, crashing him into a mountain. He had not lost his life, but had lost a leg, an arm, most of his hearing and all of his sight. Alive, but unable to experience his true love, flying, Cid had wasted away within a year of his crash from pure grief. His only son had carried on the company and the Highwind name, until the passing of time had turned his descendants into one massive clan that had an airfield in every major city on the Planet.

Cloud and Tifa lived in Nibleheim, raising two daughters and a son. Twenty eight years after Cid's death, just after the fiftieth anniversary of Meteor's fall, Tifa contracted pneumonia and never recovered.

After Tifa's death, Cloud and Vincent realized they had Dr. Hojo to thank for the fact that neither of them would die anytime soon. The experiments done on both of them were keeping them preserved well beyond their years. Cloud had aged, slowly but surely since Meteor, but Vincent looked as he had when he left the coffin. Cloud left Nibleheim, sometimes living in the Canyon, sometimes traveling with Vincent, sometimes going off on his own. He lived to be over two hundred years old before he died at the Canyon. The world had mourned their great hero for a year.

Vincent criss-crossed the entire planet nearly a hundred times since Meteor, and each time he learned something new and different. Sometimes he lived in a particular city for a year, two years, a decade, depending on the type of people within. He was proof of Meteor and the prowess of Jenova and mako. He would leave a village, the children trailing his steps, and return years later to find those children as old men and women, with children and grandchildren of their own while he barely changed. He watched as a field of tree saplings was planted in memory of Aerith and had returned many years later to walk beneath the massive trees that were the result. Between himself and Nanaki, they held the greatest measure of authority on the Planet. Warring factions would take their counsel to heart, and would abide by their judgments in any situation. They kept the peace, the great feline leader of the Canyon, and the wandering gunman of the world.

Now, the great peace-keepers, the great leaders, were slipping from shadow to shadow, unseen and silent, like a couple of teens sneaking out after dark or the assassins they had once been. They tread through the city, ever alert to the many who still walked the streets, booted feet and velveted paws silent on the stone canyon floor.

An hour passed and they were free of the now-sprawling city, walking north in easy, companionable silence. The dark was nothing to their eyes, any creatures still within the canyon posed no danger. And for a moment, under the stars and the odd, twisting shadows of the Canyon walls, they almost looked young again, setting their eyes towards their adventure. And if they stopped and listened to the wind whistling through the stone, then they could almost hear the long-gone voices of their friends, asking them why they stopped, if they heard or smelled anything. If they unfocused their eyes and just watched the shadows, they could almost see them, young and strong and determined to see it all through to the end.

o o o

They climbed the stone steps in silence, unnoticed as they entered the dark city for the first time in a year. Nanaki walked slowly, a deep, tired ache in his old bones. His head drooped near his paws, and he was grateful for Vincent's comforting hand on his back, though he envied the gunman for still being as graceful and fit as he had been when they first met. They entered the old observatory, Nanaki noting that someone had kept it clean and neat in his absence. The great feline slumped onto his bed, his gray nose resting on his paws. Vincent dragged the armchair nearer to his friend's bed and sank into it gratefully.

Silence reigned for a time before Nanaki sighed heavily. "Thank you," He said softly. "For convincing me to come with you. I would have kicked myself a hundred times for not seeing them all again had I not gone."

"Not a problem." Vincent replied gently.

"I'm tired, Vincent." Nanaki breathed. "So very tired."

"Then sleep." Vincent said, his human hand rubbing the muscles in the feline's back. "Sleep. I shall watch over you, and I will see you when you wake." Nanaki gave him his own version of a smile and settled comfortably into the bed. Vincent waited. The breathing beneath his hand slowed, stopped. The thrum of the feline's heart stopped a moment later. He waited to be sure, then sat back, his hand still on Nanaki's neck. He closed his eyes-

o o o

-and opened them in a field.

He stood, looking around. Nanaki rose beside him, the Nanaki he remembered best, still a child in the eyes of his clan but still wise, still strong, fiery and powerful. He shook out his black mane and looked up at the gunman. Vincent looked down at himself, unsurprised to see his metal claw gone, replaced by flesh and bone. His mind was clear, his demons gone, his soul at rest. He laughed, as free and uninhibited as a child.

"Never thought I'd see that."

He turned, meeting eyes the color of the sky and a cocky, arrogant stance. The pilot grinned and embraced the gunman. "'Bout time you guys got here." He growled.

"About time you stopped smoking." Vincent replied, returning the embrace.

"No cigarettes in paradise." Cid said, releasing his hold on the gunman. "They sent me to lead you guys to the rest of them. That way." He pointed and they turned to look.

At the top of a hill, silhouetted against the sky, was a familiar group waving down at them. Young and strong and beautiful, they waited as their friends climbed the hill to meet them and, at long last, rest.


End file.
